Sexual wellness companies, universities, nonprofits and medical professionals are joining forces to increase scientific rigor in the sexual wellness field. Biotech startup Vella Bioscience, for example, has created the Consortium for the Study of Women’s Sexual Wellness, an initiative that’s tapped 10 medical experts with the mission of “advancing innovation in non-pharmaceutical female sexual health tools.”

“Research and innovation in women’s health is grossly underserved,” says Vella CEO Carolyn Wheeler. “Solutions to help us live equally full lives are underdeveloped or nonexistent. The formation of the Consortium is about establishing new norms for women by increasing public education and offering guidance for best practices for evaluating efficacy.”

In September, the organization The Menopause Society released results of a survey that revealed women 50 years old and over are among the fastest-growing groups of cannabis users, with the cohort using CBD and THC during or after menopause for medical and recreational reasons. While people going through menopause have long been self-treating with cannabis, an emerging understanding of how menopause affects the endocannabinoid system has led experts like Anna Barbieri, a physician and founder of menopause healthcare provider Elektra Health, and OB-GYN Jessica Shepherd, chief medical officer at Verywell Health and founder and CEO of Sanctum Med + Wellness, to be optimistic about CBD and THC’s benefits for issues like sleep disruption and mood imbalances.

Last month in the academic journal “Advances in Reproductive Sciences,” researchers from the department of obstetrics and gynecology at Texas Tech University Health Sciences, including Bayley Richardson and Alisa White, published a study showing that what it described as “next-generation” lubricants from budding brands such as Personal Fav and Uberlube outperformed legacy medical lubricants such as Pre-Seed for sperm motility. According to the study, “Newer formulations of lubricant are less likely to interfere with sperm function.”

Below, we check in on other recent developments in the sexual wellness field.

Facing digital advertising restrictions, sexual wellness brands often turn to in-person activations to raise awareness and educate. Maude founder Éva Goicochea and actress Dakota Johnson, co-creative director at the brand, are putting a unique spin on in-person activations by collaborating with the Museum of Sex on one of its inaugural exhibitions in Miami, where the exhibition was previewed this week at Art Basel. Entitled “Modern Sex: 100 Years of Design and Decency,” it features 500 objects from the last century, including sex toys, books and posters, to examine cultural debates about and the impacts of barriers to the marketing and distribution of sexual health products.

The Museum of Sex just opened a 32,000-square-foot location in Miami. The museum’s first location is in New York City. In Miami, the Modern Sex exhibition will run from January until summer next year.

Over in Amsterdam, sexual wellness brand The Oh Collective has been holding a pop-up called The Oh Collective Café in collaboration with Maha+, a newly opened shop and community space by chic fashion boutique Maha Amsterdam. The week-long pop-up aims to encourage people to explore sexual wellness products and engage in sexual wellness- and intimacy-related discussions and workshops.

“Maha Amsterdam has been a prominent lifestyle brand for women and the audience is aligned with our brand,” says The Oh Collective co-founder Eden Chiang. “Positioned as a neighborhood store in the heart of Amsterdam, we would see familiar faces visiting two to three times weekly. Increased brand exposure correlates with higher conversion rates. We think that emphasizes the importance of integrating sexual wellness into everyday life, steering from just traditional ‘sex shops’ or ‘red-light districts.’”

Chiang sees lifestyle retailers such as Maha and Patta, a trendy fashion flagship in Amsterdam, as key partners for intimate care brands. She says, “Our mission is aligned to drive culture forward, but also serve as a means to normalize and educate about sexual wellness across a broader audience.”

Clean lube brand Coconu has made its first foray into the device category with the launch of personal massager Wave. British sexual wellness retailer and marketplace SheSpot has partnered with sex-positive social network Killing Kittens on Come Closer Calendar, a 12-day luxury advent calendar priced at $226 and filled with over $450 worth of handpicked intimacy items from brands like Bijoux Indiscrets, The Oh Collective and Bird.

Doctor-developed intimacy and care brand Future Method has partnered with the organization Sex Ed for Social Change (SIECUS) on playful merch, including the $19.99 post-play clean-up Bedside Towel and $29.99 Daddy Hat embroidered with the saying, “Take it. Easy.” Twenty percent of proceeds from sales of the items and Future Method’s $49.99 bergamot-, clove- and cedar-infused Bedside Manner Candle will go to SIECUS. Additionally, the two entities will jointly promote content and educational materials to spread SIECUS’s mission of advancing sex education through advocacy, policy and coalition building.

Sexual wellness brand Playground has teamed up with luxury lingerie specialist Fleur du Mal to launch two limited-edition holiday bundles, $108 Play Date and $98 Private Party. The bundles include Playground’s plant-based and pH-balanced intimacy oil Mood Maker and a sexy selection from Fleur du Mal. They’re available on both brands’ e-commerce websites through the end of the year.

Her Juice Bar has rolled out a comprehensive rebrand that took a year to execute, partly because the transformation was more than bottle and box deep. The 4-year-old intimate wellness brand’s upgraded and expanded range encompasses intimate skincare, supplements and suppositories priced from $20 to $40.

“Our mission is to ensure that every facet of our brand echoes our core values of care, empowerment and inclusivity. This philosophy is the very essence of what Her Juice Bar stands for,” says founder Abigail Murdock, adding, “This rebrand was not merely about changing our aesthetic, it was about deepening our commitment to providing products that women can trust and elevating our dedication to offering a premium, user-friendly experience…Our ambition was to craft a luxurious  and personalized experience for every woman who turns to us. The positive response from our customers to our new look and feel has been overwhelming and heartening.”

Taking a cue from Spotify Wrapped, sexual wellness device maker Lioness has unveiled the first-ever “Pleasure Wrapped,” a report packed with masturbation and orgasm data compiled from over 29,000 masturbation sessions using the brand’s “diagnostic” vibrator, which is app-enabled to capture the length and intensity of orgasms. The report divulges that Lioness users masturbate, on average, for 4 minutes and 19 seconds and masturbate the most on Sundays.

In less joyous news, British period care brand Ohne is shuttering after six years. Friday will mark the the British period care brand’s final day of shipping. It’s currently offering 60% off its period pants, and shoppers will receive three of them for free for every three pairs of period pants they purchase. In a customer email, Ohne said, “Despite our incredible wins, however, the challenges of upholding our vision (to the standard that we believe in) became tougher and tougher.”